‘So,’ said the property agent, ‘that completes the inventory.’ He made his way through the hallway of the small Victorian terraced house and stopped by the front door. ‘All I now need to do is hand over these.’
He placed a set of keys in the palm of the new tenant’s hand. The young woman’s fingers closed around them. Seconds later they were in the back pocket of her jeans. The property agent was about to let himself out when he paused. Turning, he gave the young woman a businesslike smile. Always the professional.
‘I understand you’re moving in tomorrow. Let me be the first to wish you every happiness in your new home.’
The girl didn’t return his smile. He wasn’t surprised. You met all sorts in this job. The polite and pleasant. The dour and rude. Then there were those that fitted somewhere in between. He wasn’t quite sure where this new tenant figured on the spectrum of social manners. She had attitude with a capital A, and the downward turn of her mouth signalled that this particular client hadn’t smiled in a long time.
Chapter One
Jade Ferguson slotted the key into the lock of the door. Home. Or hopefully it would soon seem like it. Although, on this cold February afternoon, she had yet to warm to the two-up two-down Victorian property in Gresham Terrace.
She’d taken a six-month rental on the dwelling whilst deciding what next to do with her life. She was only twenty-eight years old. Still a young woman. Right now, she felt seven decades older. Clapped out. Drained. Emotionally knackered.
Yesterday had been Valentine’s Day. Some of the windowsills in her new road were currently sporting commercial cards. Declarations of love on paper. They’d all been placed just so, letting the outside world know that those within were in happy and loving relationships.
In the past Jade had enjoyed her own fair share of slushy cards. But not this year. This year had been… different.
She’d recently spent three months in a psychiatric unit. Not that it was called that. Not these days anyway. Usually such places had very neutral sounding names. After all, it wasn’t only celebrities who had the monopoly on nervous breakdowns.
Rehab wasn’t just for famous alcoholics or actors who had accidentally become addicted to prescription pills. Oh no. These days anyone could check into a place like Clarendon House, with its pretty clematis climbing around grand portals that overlooked manicured lawns.
The gardens were frequented by both patients and staff alike, the latter always smiling and softly spoken, for calm and tranquillity were important.
All types stayed here, from the anorexic and bulimic, the clinically depressed and suicidal, to the addicts and self-harmers. This place saw them all, whether a pop star or personal assistant, from the infamous to the ordinary… like Jade.
She’d spent her time at Clarendon House piecing back together the fragments of her shattered emotions. All because of one man. Tom Harrison.
Jade still struggled not to turn into a weeping mess as a photographic image of Tom rolled through her mind. Gorgeous, handsome Tom. Her boss. And lover. Now her ex-boss. Ex-lover.
Her stomach scrunched like screwed-up paper as the photographic image turned into a moving film inside her head. Tom laughing at one of Jade’s silly jokes… the way his hazel eyes crinkled so attractively at the corners… the hint of tanned skin that made him look like he’d spent a long weekend in Marbella… dark hair flecked with silver that she’d so loved running her fingers through… warm hands that had always tangled in her hair when his mouth had come down upon hers.
‘Hi,’ he’d said ten years earlier, when interviewing Jade. ‘I’m Tom Harrison, the Senior Partner at Harrison & Peters Solicitors. Do you think you’re up for the job as my personal assistant?’
‘Absolutely,’ Jade had smiled, extending her hand in a businesslike manner.
Tom had been surprised at the young woman’s grasp. Firm. She’d shaken hands like a man. He’d liked that. It exuded confidence, which was rare in someone of Jade’s tender years.
Back then Jade hadn’t been like most of her eighteen-year-old peers. Her goals had extended beyond following the latest beauty vlogger or knowing the organic ingredients of their latest make-up launch.
Fresh out of secretarial college, she’d been ambitious. A go-getter. She’d left college armed with all her certificates and an overload of self-assurance. Her parents had been so proud, especially when she’d walked straight into the top secretarial job at this thriving local law firm that was giving some of its London